Show177
The electronic check company claimed that it had a database of "every driver's license number in the state" that it used to verify whether a check was good. In a pre-Internet world, not sure how a private company would have access to that information without just cause. Seems like a violation of privacy rights. And how can a driver's license number verify whether a check is good or not? If the driver's license numbers are tied to people's bank accounts, that means the check company would also have access to their banking information. Again, it seems like a gross violation of privacy laws. Even if they did have all that information, they certainly wouldn't be able to tell whether an account had the money in it at the moment the check was presented or if the account was even still open. The check cashing guy bragged that it takes 4 seconds to verify the check is good, but all we saw was long wait times on the phone while customers got very impatient. Even the phone call to the cops had to have taken longer than 4 seconds due to the way the phones worked back then. Guess they hadn't figured out a way to link the verification data to actual cash registers yet. How was this quicker than just simply calling the bank to verify the check was good? Seems like false advertising. Submitted by DellaMason 12/1/23
Shades of 1957s Desk Set starring Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy, she a reference librarian and he an efficiency expert with computer punchcards, whose "socks don't always match." jfh 23Dec2023
Hooray, it’s the second Space Age story in a row (Aerospace Reliability Associates is the firm), and yet somewhat noir-ish, especially with Bogie-wannabe Gerald Mohr in a major role. Macready gives the whole thing some gravitas, but I would have liked to have seen more of him. Submitted by gracenote, 2/2/2011.
I have to add that I just love the technology in this episode, especially the electronic check verification. Submitted by gracenote, 2/2/2011.
+ The enlargements that Burger later presents in court indicate that the checks were also perforated to thwart alteration, a form of check protection technology dating from the 1800s. A dot-matrix “3” and other perforated characters can be seen - somewhat like this , made by the Abbott Automatic Check Protector, patented 1889. More antique “physical check protection” here. Added by Gary Woloski, 11/30/11.
For the umpteenth time this season, Ray Collins gets credit for playing Tragg, but does not actually appear. Submitted by gracenote, 2/2/2011.
Perry wears three different collar types. Early in the show, he's wearing a collar tie. He switches to a button-down collar. By the courtroom scene and the ending, he's wearing a spread collar. Otto Gervaert, 1/18/21.>>?
Gerald Mohr plays Austin Lloyd. Lloyd Austin is the current U.S. Secretary of Defense. Otto Gervaert, 2/17/23.
The opening shot is of the California Spruce Medical Building at 500 Spruce Street in San Francisco (see for example Google maps), but the shot continues on to the sign for Aerospace Reliability Associates, which is at 653 N. Sixth Street in Los Angeles (per the “asdfgh…” letter that Miss Clover is typing). Submitted by masonite, 12/01/2011.
+ The addresses in the show often feature (what people call) inside jokes: using the studio on Las Palmas, or something otherwise connected with the show. That wouldn't work for what is supposed to be a downtown location, but how to come up with something plausible?? The solution was simple (and clever): like many cities in the U.S. Los Angeles uses the Philadelphia System for its streets - streets are numbered if they run in one direction, but named if they run orthogonally; but unlike the original, in L.A. the numbered streets run east/west...so N(orth) Sixth Street doesn't exist. A remarkable attention to detail. Notcom, 060221
Oh, that Gloria Talbott ... those eyes!! Submitted by MikeReese, 12/13/2013.
Elementary?: Perry learned, at 23:25 on the 2011 Paramount DVD, that it was very quick and easy to switch typewriter elements so as to get a different character set. Also present were Terry Clover and Roscoe Pearce. Why, then, did the later preliminary hearing need to take 9+ minutes of episode time trying to "prove" which typewriter did which typing? Perry could have easily shown early on that Hamilton was actually proving nothing. Further, given that the DA's office and LAPD were also using typewriters, someone in either office also surely knew about the ridiculousness of the point that Hamilton was trying to prove. Scriptwriter Samuel Newman had a clever gimmick with the electronic check approval, then seemed to me to overly pad his script with the typing nonsense. Luckily for Dwight Garrett, Bonnie Lloyd liked his type. lowercase masonite, 3/4/16.
+ "I am a little world made cunningly of elements," Perry says, quoting John Donne's "Holy Sonnets." Mike Bedard 7.9.16.
+ The typewriters are a matched pair of IBM Selectrics. This line was first introduced in 1961. The font spheres which IBM officially called "typing elements" were generally called "type balls" or "golf balls" by those who used them. I was one such user, more than 50 years ago, and i also learned typesetting on the same company's high-end proportional-width-font machine, the IBM Selectric Composer. Read more here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Selectric_typewriter Submitted by catyron, May 11, 2018
The Telecredit reports shown when Bonnie Lloyd is buying the airline tickets and when she is buying the radio are identical. The report lists several names but not hers. The last name typed, Harry Paxtin, appears to have a fraudulent license. Submitted by Kilo 8/19/2018.
The Typewriter Evidence. With Lt Anderson on the stand, Burger presents enlarged specimens of legitimate and bogus Project Reports and cheques to show on which of two typewriters they were produced. The typewriters, also in court, are IBM Selectrics (electric typewriters introduced 1961). The Selectric was then unique in having a fixed carriage (paper holder) and a laterally moving printing element (a rotating “type ball”). Read about the Selectric here. How it works here (3:05 video). Selectric Museum here (In the top image at this link, the larger, square-shaped machines in the pile are mostly Selectric IIs [intro 1971]; one blue Selectric III [intro 1980] is at bottom right).
- Burger and Anderson remain totally unaware of the innovative features of the Selectric until midway through Perry’s cross-examination of Anderson. Until that point, everyone in the courtroom but Perry thinks that Selectrics are just run-of-the-mill typewriters.
- I'm sure I heard the motor start to whir when Lt Anderson initially touched the first machine. I think that there must have been a microphone specially placed to capture this sound. Well Done!
- When Lt. Anderson types his comparison texts at Perry’s urging, you can see that the carriage is stationary and, if you watch very closely, you may catch a glimpse of the type ball moving across the page. The IBM logo plate on the top deck is well shown several times.
- When Perry quickly and expertly demonstrates how to exchange the elements, Anderson and Burger are confounded and struck speechless.
- The typeface in the courtroom enlargements appears to be “Adjutant“ (this shows a generic Adjutant font). Some ID points: prominent serifs, the numeral for “three,” shallow “v” in the capital “M.” A sample of the genuine IBM Selectric Adjutant is here.
- The passage in the original “DIMOS” Reliability Report presented by Burger reads “therefore, the trade off analysis juxtaposing size, weight, and strength clearly indicates MIL - Q - 34D2b will be required for the structural frame of the payload package.” In the bogus substitute report, the "b" in the MIL-Q designator has been replaced with a "c". A "MIL-Q" would have been a Department of Defense Quality Standard.
If you have an old Selectric in the basement, you may wish to check out the Yahoo Golf ball typewriter shop. With assistance from David Sadowski, Yahoo! Typewriter Group. Added by Gary Woloski, 11/28/11.
The gimmick of switching the element only makes sense in the unlikely case someone was aware of a distinctive difference between them. DOD 01/03/20
Lt. Anderson didn't type nearly enough letters to reflect the text that was shown on the sheet of paper he showed. —yelocab 05APR18
...and to type that line of letter N, he need only have held down the N key. DOD 01/18/21